Obama’s Logic in Latin America

See, I’m trying to look passed the obvious — Obama wants other countries to like us so much he’s willing to throw away our long-held principles against left-wing dictatorships in our own hemisphere for temporary political gain. Like his ideological predecessor, Jimmy Carter, Obama will undoubtedly learn that getting bad people to like you doesn’t change the bad people, it just gives them more leverage over your interests down the road and more legitimacy to continue suppressing their own people.

I’m willing to entertain the idea that Obama has a plan. Like in implementing his old-school liberal agenda here in America, he’s thinking in stages: first the stimulus, then more private-sector takeovers, then a down-payment on national health care, all in stages, all leading us to a common place down the road — the smiley-faced “all for our benefit” welfare-state model of the “soft-tyranny” plaguing Europe and parts of Latin America. So, perhaps Obama is getting all weak-kneed and wussy around the bad guys because he knows we can push our interests on them in two ways: peaceful cooperation or coercion. Obama is choosing the former.

If that’s the case, I think he’s going about it the wrong way. Our problem in Latin America has historically been that we don’t finish the job once we intervene. All the nations who we’ve given up on after an intervention have fallen into chaos (Somalia being the most recent example), while those we’ve occupied and stuck with have eventually prospered and positively joined the world community. Obama just gave these tin-can dictators a license to remain in power using the US as a scapegoat with no real argument from the US this time! Even if Obama has a long-term strategy here, it’s apt to blow back in our face.

It’ not that Obama has no problem with dictatorships–its that he has no problem with left-wing dictatorships. If there were one right-wing one in south America he would simply say it wasn’t elected fairly. Did you notice the other day he said ALL current latin American countries had freely elected their leaders, that is all except Cuba. I will give him credit for that. When Obama and Chavez met I saw nothing wrong with the handshake. These two men have a lot in common. Their hair, their complexion, their desire not to have off-shore drilling off the U.S. coast, their desire to limit political opposition in their respective countries, their desire to install socialist governments in their countries, and their desire to become full-fledged dictators. These guys are so much alike we could swap. Only problem is that Chavez doesn’t speak english, but then he could use a translator. So thats ok since Obama needs his totus. Lets swap.

Obama’s real interest is indeed to make these lunatics ‘like us.’ Being a “listener and a leader” isn’t exactly going to compel the Castro brothers or Comrade Danny Boy Ortega to stop killing people. In fact, Obama has just proven himself to be the best recruiter for leftist thugs world wide. Additionally, Al Quaeda will notice their volunteers increasing because of Obama’s incredible weakness. Weakness invites war – always has and always will. And it will be conservative kids in the armed forces that will pay the price.